Hasegawa 1/72 TBM-1C "Atlantic"

The Grumman TBF Avenger (designated TBM for aircraft manufactured by General Motors) was a torpedo bomber developed initially for the United States Navy and Marine Corps, and eventually used by several air or naval arms around the world. It entered U.S. service in 1942, and first saw action during the Battle of Midway. The aircraft saw extensive post-war use as an ASW aircraft in Hunter-Killer teams and later operating on its own. One of the last military users of the TBM was the Canadian Navy, which retired theirs in 1960 when replaced by S2F Trackers. These airframes were also popular as fire bombers with three still being used in this role in Canada as late as 2007. Many ex-fire bombers have been sold to be restored as war birds or museum aircraft.

As Hasegawa also does a TBM-3, it should not be surprising that there are a few parts on the sprues that are dedicated to that variant, specifically the rockets and different aft lower clear part. This kit has Hasegawa's usual somewhat Spartan cockpit with decals for the instrument panel. Everything else is pretty simple as kits go. The turret does not rotate and it looks as if it has to be installed fairly early in construction when the fuselage halves are glued together. It does have an optional open or closed bomb bay, which is a nice feature. A torpedo is the lone weapon provided, though Avengers did carry bombs and depth charges as well. In fact, the latter would have been more appropriate for this particular boxing as I don't think any subs were ever sunk with air dropped torpedoes.

Instructions are the usual well drawn type with Gunze paint references. Markings are for two Atlantic Scheme aircraft in white and dark gull grey. The box art plane is from VC-42 while the other similarly painted plane is from VC-58. Decals are old school Hasegawa, but should work if one uses hot water for application.

So, I'm sure this has become more pricey as time has progressed, but as it is one of those kits that isn't actually zooming off the shelves, locating one should not be much of a problem.

http://en.wikipedia.org

Scott Van Aken